This morning I woke up and scrolled through some sites on my phone.  The first was Youversion.com.  Great sight and I would encourage you to use it as much as possible.  The next site which I found myself was Google news.  I love Google News because they are a source for almost every news outlet.  I found this very disturbing article here about Iran placing restrictions on the news media.  About an hour later, I was reading some blogs and found myself at my friend Pete’s blog, which is very insightful.  Pete talked about this news coverage piece of “news” where President Obama is getting comfortable with ABC news. One of my strengths is connectedness.  This strength helps me connect things in my mind that sometimes are connected and sometimes are not.  But this is a really big one I’m going to need your help on, whether your liberal or conservative.

Is this okay?

I spent some time chatting last night with a relative of mine who makes a part of his living in the world of finance.  She’s also a mobster.  I was informed of all the mess taking place right now with the banks and the economy and reminded of my own selfishness.  It’s possible that our country will be going through some real hardship for the next 10-15 years if the bailout bill doesn’t take place, and if it does take place, it’s simply a band-aid on a really scarred situation.  A cover-up in the name of keeping our way of life as-is.  Though financially Carie and I certainly have our stuff in order, I’m convicted by the unwise spending I have done at times, in the name of financial certainty.  And so my hope is two-fold:

1.  That during these times the church will step up and become “the church” we’re called to be.
2.  That I would make wiser decisions with my finances, in good times and bad.

People are always more important than money.

Imagine:

What if your power went out for one week?  Not just in your house, but your entire city, which would also affect your work environment too.  No refrigerator, no freezer (sorry Sam’s club users), no television or hairdryers, or internet.  To be honest, that would totally stink for me.  One couldn’t even DVR “Prison Break” with this particular crisis.

But this is what is happening right now in Ohio.  Hurricane Ike rode through Texas, not causing as much damage as many believed it would, and like most hurricanes, lost some steam as it traveled north by land.  Then on Sunday it rode into Ohio and blew its 70 mph winds and rain onto the Ohio mainland, and it would appear that all the emergency vehicles that Ohio had were away in Texas.  Therefore, they were not prepared for what would happen if the electricity went out for a week.  But they are finding out now.

My friend Clay called me last night and shared that he was on his way to pick up his father-in-laws generator.  “You can’t buy one right now,” he said to me sounding more tired than normal.  Of course.  After about three days of having no power in his entire house, or at work, a 9 office enterprise he’s co-owned for 5 years or so, not to mention not being able to blog his thoughts on politics through the whole ordeal, I’d be sounding tired too.

But I have an idea for Clay (who can’t read this quite yet) and for anyone else who is out of power for this extended period of time.  What if you were to stop, and before you get involved in a lot of work to make this “problem” go away,  sit around with your wife and kid(s), and/or your best friends, college roommates, co-workers, and just talk and play and chill for a while?  Not just an evening, but a big 24 hour ordeal.

What if you took advantage of this currently irreparable problem and turned back the clock, and forced yourselves to enjoy the company, not of a 50 inch square box with surround sound, but the company of one another, really taking time to connect with the people in your life?

Please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not saying I want this electricity problem to ever happen to my beautiful area of the northeast US…

I’m just wondering how that would affect our lives?

Update:  The power company has told Clay that his power “just might” be on from Thursday to Sunday.  Thanks for that info, Captain Obvious of the Ohio Light Department!

This post is a part of Watercooler Wednesday.

I was 12 years old in 1987, and this is a true story.

I loved to play football as a young boy.  Still do.  I’m just a lot more sore by the end of it.  So one day in September, 1987, my sister and I and our 9 year old neighbor Mario rode our bikes about a quarter of a mile to see if our neighbor down the street “Ethy” wanted to play football.  Brian and I were closer friends than the other 2, so I was really hoping he would play.

His real name was Brian, but everyone called him “Ethy” because he was so skinny.  Lay off, it was the midwest in the 80′s.  So he said he would play.  We all ran out of his house and towards our bikes, jumped on them and took off.  I led the way, followed by Brian, my sister Amie, then Mario at the end.  As we drove toward our football field that day, “Ethy” yelled at me, “I’ll race you”, and made his way past me.

I of course sped up in an effort to win the race.  For several yards we raced next to each other, when suddenly our handle bars collided, stuck together, then catapuled us away from each other.  I immediately fell to the ground on the green grass of someones front lawn.  Brian fell the other way, into an oncoming car driving the opposite way.

He died three days later, never waking up from his state of unconsciousness.

That was 21 years ago today.  Brian was 13.

I’m 33.

I went to a viewing  tonight. 

It was for the grandfather of my friend, Jason and his brother, my new blogger friend Chris.  Their grandfather lived a full life, and was in his 90′s (I believe) when he passed away this last weekend.  But something struck me as I talked to them for only a brief moment – I had very little to say.

I reached out my hand  to them, and said “If there’s anything I can do for your family, please let me know.”  Earlier I had told Jason I would be praying for him and his family.  And those were the only words I had.  The night was certainly not about me, and they had a line of people talking to them, so I walked away after being there for only a short time and saying only these few short words.

As I drove away on this beautiful evening here in new England, I started questioning whether I was a very good pastor or not.  Shouldn’t I be loaded with good things to say at this time?  Shouldn’t I be able to tell them how it’s all good and God is good and everythngs going to be all right?  And while I certainly believe each of those things, I coudn’t bring myself to dig up the trite expressions of the positive person I am.  All I could say was, in essence, “I’m here for you.  Whatever I can do, just say my name.”

My heart was heavy thinking about it.  So I called up my own grandfather (not realizing the irony of it) in Indiana.  He’s been a pastor since 1964, and surely he’d tell me the things I should have said.  I told him of my plight, and of how I felt inept of my calling, and how I should have been able to say something else – something profound.

Unfortunately (or not) he told me I said the only thing you could say – an encouraging word.  “No need to expound on doctrine or rhetoric at that point, but just offer an encouraging word of prayer and/or scripture” In a sense, you can just be there for them.

So that’s what I am.  Here, for my friend if he needs it, and here if he’s doing good.  The point about friendship is that a friend is there for their friends.  Not necessarily profound or smart or good or cunning – but just there.

And so for all of my friends and family and church family and community – I’m here, even if that’s all I have to say.

I received news yesterday that has really got me thinking. Please allow me to elaborate.

Before I go into my news, let me just say that one of the things that really inspires me is the 6th man.  For those of you who are not big sports fans, the 6th man is the basketball term for the man or woman who does not start, and is not necessarily the biggest “star player” on the team, but they frequently come in and assert their importance in the way they play their role.  That role may be a 3 pointer, or rebounding, or blocked shots, or even scoring field goals (not through the uprights), but there is no doubt that they a)make a huge impact and b)are in the game for a very specific task.

Some examples of great 6th men are Kevin McHale, Bill Walton, Dennis Rodman (pre-skirt days), Leandro Barbosa, and others who I will no doubt be chastised for forgetting.

So yesterday I received some news that a close friend of my family had been diagnosed with lung cancer.  His name is Bob.  Bob lives in Fremont, Ohio. 

Bob is an amazing guy who always has a smile on his face.  Bob and his wife Judy helped out in the youth group at our church growing up.  They were not the youth pastors, but their impact was widespread.  They invited teens into their home and let them play and eat and hang out and be kids, and never asked anything of them.

If you needed to talk, Bob was there.
If you needed a hand fixing your new “used” red Pontiac 1000 (honestly, it wasn’t a chevette), Bob was there.
If you needed a ride when the 1000 broke down, Bob was there.
If the youth group needed a place to hang out and play games, Bob was there.
If the youth pastor needed a task to be done, there was no doubt that Bob was there.  Probably smiling.

Bob was never the star, but he was always accomplishing his role – the task God had given him to accomplish in his life during that time.  It was a great lesson for the son of a pastor in a small town in Ohio who would eventually become a pastor himself, but not before sitting in an assistant position for 10 years.  It was a great lesson for me.

Not everyone is the “star”, but the truly special people of this world are the ones who are not, yet shine brighter than everyone else.  This story reminds me of a story that Buddy told about a “6th man” in his church in New York.

Who has been an example of the stellar “6th” man in your life?

Until next time…

So as you can see here, there was a bit of a problem in Missouri on Thursday night as a man who lived in the town decided he didn’t like the town officials or the mayor or several police officers and began to shoot anyone in his way.  Unbelievable story of a psychotic episode.

Here’s the story in a nutshell.

Man lives in small town.
Man probably gets mistreated by a few people, including cops, along the way.
Man goes to town meetings and complains, but is not a very good communicator.
Man gets made fun of and is prohibited from speaking in town meetings anymore.
Man takes it for only a short while and keeps it inside and begins to boil with hatred inside.
Man takes matters one Thursday evening into his own hands.
Town emergency.

There’s a lot to talk about concerning this story.  You could go into a discussion of guns or politics or psychotherapy, but I think I’ll leave it at this thought:

Does one person matter?

If a group of people get together for a town meeting, and ultimately decide to exclude from their meetings, one particular man, does that matter?

I’m not pretending to answer this question because there are so many answers.  I could say, “Yes, one person matters” and get hit with several responses on how the man was probably psycho and that he was disruptive to the future of the town, and so he needed to be excluded and that would probably be justified,

Or I could say, “No, we should think about the good of the town”and get hit with the importance of the individual, and that without the individual, the town would not be in existence, also a true and justified answer.

I only know this:  That for those people, in that time, one person did matter.

And for me, today, everyone I meet and talk to and who talks to me, matters. Because eventually that person will become part of my community.

What do you think?

Until next time…

Please pray for Carie’s (my wife) school, Nashoba Regional High School today.

Carie just emailed me and told me that a young man in her home room was in an accident yesterday and pronounced dead two hours later.

She told me that he was running on the road for an upcoming wrestling match and some friends of his that were driving in a car hit him.  To make matters worse, some of the EMT responders were Nashoba students, so it has been a tramatic experience for the families involved and the school as a whole.

Please pray.